Health care workers joined search and rescue crews as the Turkish metropolis Istanbul hosted what authorities dubbed the country's biggest medical evacuation drill against a possible earthquake.

In Heybeliada, one of the Princes' Islands off the coast of the city, teams of the Directorate of Health, the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) and the National Medical Rescue Teams (UMKE) simulated emergency response. Helicopters and rescue vessels accompanied them as they evacuated "the injured" off the island, taking them to hospitals in the city.

In line with a predetermined scenario, crews pulled out the injured from the ruins of houses on the island, providing first aid before taking them to a sea ambulance and later to a hospital in the Kartal district of Istanbul. Some among the "injured" were taken to an evacuation vessel, while those in critical condition was airlifted from the vessel.

Speaking about the drill, associate professor Kenan Ahmet Türkdoğan, who heads the emergency health services department of the Directorate of Health in Istanbul, said 12 public agencies and 300 personnel worked in the drill that "reflected the success of coordination in such cases." "It was a simulation of how the first response should be and how different agencies can coordinate evacuation and medical efforts. This is the biggest exercise of its kind and involved every angle of an earthquake scenario, from response to the slightly injured to the transfer of people whose health condition worsened to other health care facilities," he told Anadolu Agency (AA) on Friday.

Türkdoğan noted that they started the drill half an hour before the planned time to test how prepared the participants were and to demonstrate how accomplished the response units are. He also said there was great communication between different crews, from search and rescue teams to paramedics. "We also tested the success of our evacuation vessel and managed to rapidly evacuate the injured," he added.